What Was I Thinking?

Have you heard of National Novel Writing Month? Those in the know, refer to it as NaNoWriMo and their motto is, “November 1st-30th Thirty days and nights of literary abandon.”

My friend Donna, from Donna and the DogsJust Toby asked me if I’d participate with her. And in a moment of folly, I agreed.

The challenge is to write the rough draft of a novel, (50,000 words) in a month.

The month of November. You know the month that’s currently four days away.

The same November which includes the last 30 days in my personal challenge of writing a blog post every day for two consecutive years.

Now I’m sitting here saying, what was I thinking?

I’m 33 days away from completing my two-year challenge.

I’m in the beginnings of hosting a fund-raising calendar event.

I just started a Co-Hosted Follow-Up Friday Blog Hop.

I’m helping throw a baby shower in three weeks.

I’m going to visit my sister for three days over Thanksgiving.

Delilah and I are signed up to start a tricks class on the 13th.

Just where the hell am I going to find the time to write 50,000 words?

You may remember the success I had with my previous novel. Yeah, you know, the one that’s stalled at about 27,000 words. 27,000 words that took me MONTHS (that’s a plural right there) to write. The same novel I haven’t touched in months. Now I’m no mathematician but I know damn well 27,000 is way less than 50,000 and 90 days is way more than a month.

I have to tell you, I’m kind of stalled with the first novel and the second novel is rolling around in my head, in fact it’s been rolling around for months, which I think is exactly why I haven’t been working on the first one.

Donna messaged me Friday night and asked if I still wanted to do it.

I’m pretty sure I do. I’m also pretty sure I won’t get 50,000, but I won’t know unless I try.

In order for this to work, something’s got to give.

You guys know I love comments right? I love your comments and I love responding to your comments. It can however be very time consuming sometimes.

It pains me to say this but, I may have to stop replying to every single comment. I may have to lump them all into one single comment or (HORRORS) not reply at all.

That’s my plan for the moment. If it changes, I’ll let you know.

By the end of November I’ll probably look like this.

Permanent expression after NaNoWriMo? I sure hope not.

What is that saying? If you want something done, give it to a busy person.

Comments

I cannot keep up with replying to every single comment on my blog and also comment on other people’s blogs so I do not reply to comments on my blog as much as I’d like. As you say, something has to give. I reply when I find the time. Winter usually gives me a bit more time.

BOL – we are trying it too. I’ve had an idea for a story in my head for a while and decided to try it. My husband tried to co-author a story last year with his sister and it didn’t work so well. Sigh… Good luck!

You must really love a good challenge You have been successful with this one, why not the next one? It will just force you to re-prioritize EVERYTHING!! Just think about the feeling of accomplishment you will have when you successfully write 50,000 (or more!) words. You can do it, we’ll cheer you on. (P.S. I don’t know why you would listen to me, I can’t even write a blog post every day, but I’m a great cheerleader!!)

Good luck! I am impressed with your responses on comments – I only ever get around to replying to a few. And I don’t have near the laundry list of activity you’ve got going on this month. 50,000 words may sound a lot but take it one day at a time and I’m sure you’ll surprise yourself at how much you can get done. I look forward to hearing about your progress!

My advice is to just write write write. Don’t go back and read over what you wrote, don’t ponder if that was a good scene or not, don’t correct grammar, nothing. Just write write write and then when you have 50,000 words you can go back and see what it looks like!

I’m so glad to know I am not the only one out there that does not get around to all the blogs to read and comment. I do try to comment on everyone who leaves a comment on my blog but I find it almost impossible at times to keep up with reading everyone’s blog. My new plan recently is read 2-4 blogs a day and catch up completely then stay on top of those while adding 2-4 more catch ups each day…okay that worked for the first few days and now I am almost right back where I started, behind lol

Have fun with your writing and I agree with Rosemary just write and go back later to tweek

Yaaay, NaNoWriMo! I’m so excited about getting started! And also that some of my dog blog buddies are in it too!

Suggestions? Take it one day at a time.

50k words in 30 days is 1667 words a day. Theoretically, that’s about an hour. Also? This year I’m trying out that whole “outlining” thing (on the notion that I don’t need to waste my writing time figuring out what to write. I more or less know where the story is going, due to this planning). I’m writing a sequel, and book 1 got finished up double-quick when I was like “you know, I should try this…” and outlined the final chapters. So, at non-writing times, perhaps try to jot down scenes you want to include, conversations you want to have, main plot points, etc.

Jodi! Yay! I’m doing it as well. I’m excited that you’ve committed to it. You do have a ton on your plate right now BUT you love writing and I know that the love will keep you motivated and pull you through I think that your comment related strategy is a good one and definitely understandable. Looking forward to hearing how Novel Writing Month goes for you. I’ll be rooting for and supporting you along the way my friend!

How about combining some goals and publish parts of your novel on the blog? I’d love to see what you have up your sleeve. And everyone would understand that it isn’t in a polished form. If it’s not dog-related, you could always rename female characters FiFi and Daisy and the male characters Fido and Rex. We’d never know the difference.